The Radiotherapy Department provides external beam radiation treatment of patients with a variety of malignant diseases.
NEMROCK radiation therapy department consists of:
- Simulator is a medical device that use
Kv x-ray to simulate the external beam radiation therapy treatment
procedure. It consists of diagnostic x-ray mounted on a rotating gantry
of geometries identical to those found on megavoltage therapy machines.
By this machine, radiation treatment fields are defined and marked out
on patient skin or mask before treatment.
- Computed tomography (CT) simulation, or a CT scan, features a state of the art scanner that can capture images of every curve and angle of a patient's body. Tumor are accurately outlined in the scan.
- Linear Accelerator
is a machine of mega voltage x-ray (produced by accelerating electrons
to colloid with a heavy metal target) used for external beam radiation
therapy to treat all parts of the body. LINAC is able to do all types of
radiation techniques (using MLC or customized blocks) such as 2D, 3D
conformal radiation therapy (3DCRT), Intensity-Modulated Radiation
Therapy (IMRT), Image Guided Radiation Therapy (IGR),and Stereotactic
Radio Therapy (SR). NEMROCK center has 3 linear accelerators supported
by low and high energies of both photons and electrons used to perform
the different types of radiation techniques.
- Brachytherapy
is type of radiation therapy in which radioactive seeds or sources are
placed in or near the tumor itself giving a high radiation dose to the
tumor while reducing the radiation exposure in the surrounding healthy
tissues. Brachytherapy can be used alone or in combination with other
therapies such as surgery, External Beam Radiotherapy (EBRT) and
chemotherapy. It is commonly used as an effective treatment for
cervical, prostate, breast, and can also be used to treat tumors in
many other body sites. NEMROCK provides brachytherapy for cervical and
endometrium cancer using HDR technique.
- Three-dimensional conformal radiotherapy (3DCRT)
is a type of radiotherapy in which 3D digital data set is taken for the
patient to create 3D image for both tumor and risk organs. This 3D
image helps to create a plan with high conformal dose to the tumor and
spare the adjacent normal structures which increase the tumor control.
The difference between 3DCRT and 2DRT is the ability to use non
co-planner fields and to make dose conformity around the target using
conformal blocks or Multi Leaf Collimator (MLC) which may increase the
ability of dose escalation.
- Intensity modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) is an advanced technique for delivering radiation beam more precisely than 3DCRT by modulating the intensity of every individual field.This is done by dividing the radiation field into small subfields and calculating the beam weights by special algorithms on the planning system. The difference between IMRT and 3DCRT is that IMRT is more benefit for tumor of concave volume that may surround a critical structure as in case of head and neck tumor in which spinal cord is surrounded by tumor volume. IMRT improves dose escalation for these types of tumors and decrease the dose to the surrounding normal tissue.
 - Mould Room
In Radiation therapy, patient is asked to lie in the same position
during treatment to deliver the dose to the tumor and reduce the normal
tissue irradiation. This can be accomplished by using positioning masks made for
each patient before treatment. Mould room is responsible for molding
not only the positioning masks that used during the radiation treatment
step but also responsible for producing specialized shielding for many
different treatment areas by experienced Mould Room Technicians.
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